Palace make light of travel woes to frustrate Pardew
CRYSTAL PALACE endured a journey from hell to reach Birmingham, but there was no derailing their recent revival, which is beginning to suggest that a miraculous escape from relegation is possible.
A point at the Hawthorns lifted them off the bottom for the first time this season and Roy Hodgson travelled back to London buoyed also by a warm reception from West Brom’s fans.
It was his first return to this stadium since he left to become England manager in 2012 and it is a measure of his achievements here that the Smethwick End sung his name at the final whistle.
Alan Pardew admitted Hodgson provides the high watermark at West Brom as he begins his task of steering his new side clear of the drop zone while implementing an attractive game.
As Pardew promised, West Brom played on the front foot and could have won but Palace, who had only five substitutes due to late problems, defended determinedly to give Hodgson cause for optimism.
Things had appeared bleak when setting off on Friday afternoon in a story that had you picturing Basil Fawlty at his most anguished.
‘We got to Euston in good time for the train and got on at 3.23,’ Hodgson said. ‘At 3.30 it suddenly stopped dead because of problems with the wires overhead.
‘We could not go anywhere, so we spent three and-half-hours in the dark and the cold with no toilet facilities or anything at all really until they managed to get a train alongside us to evacuate us.
‘Instead of being in Birmingham at quarter to five we arrived at 9.30pm. Then the hotel we booked was the venue for a wedding so there was plenty of noise until two in the morning.
‘So anything that could go wrong did go wrong. The players could easily have been excused for thinking this was not going to be our day but it wasn’t the case.’
It was hard to suppress a smile and, in fairness, Hodgson chuckled too, his mood brightened by a fifth point in five games.
Having lost their first seven Premier League games without scoring they are now three points behind West Brom in 17th and above West Ham and Swansea. Pardew, also up against his former club, was encouraged in his first game in charge, although he recognised the need to turn draws into wins. This was a third draw in three games to leave West Brom in the danger area.
Pardew played Salomon Rondon, Hal Robson-Kanu and Jay Rodriguez in tandem — the first time all three strikers had started together — and it was his team who started and finished in the ascendancy.
Pardew expects that once Matt Phillips, Chris Brunt and Nacer Chadli are back from injury he can implement his ideas further. ‘We tried to really unhinge them at the start, knock them out of their stride,’ he said. ‘With a little bit more quality or a break we might have won it. I’m still missing five or six who you could argue could be starters. If that’s the quality we’ll be fine. The application in the first two days and in this game I couldn’t fault. It’s just a shame we couldn’t send fans home with a win.’
Palace had been dealt a double blow before play began. Scott Dann went down with a virus and Wayne Hennessey suffered a back spasm in the warm-up.
It meant Hodgson had to position Martin Kelly at centre-back and could name only five substitutes, with no back-up goalkeeper.
Hodgson could at least continue the 4-4-2 system trialled at Brighton on Tuesday night, with Wilfried Zaha and Christian Benteke reprising the little and-large striking duo he has tended to favour in his career.
And after a promising opening from the hosts, Zaha nearly won his side a penalty when chasing down Allan Nyom’s back-pass.
Ben Foster tried to be clever and dribble out, but Zaha was on to him quickly, hastening a fall and setting himself to shoot at goal. But Foster reached out a glove, bringing down Zaha and at minimum risking an indirect free-kick. Palace appealed for both but got neither.
West Brom had chances through Rodriguez and Robson-Kanu but Palace went closest when Benteke wriggled through a couple of players and shot from close range. Foster came out sharply to save.
At the resulting corner Benteke got his header all wrong and succeeded only in directing it gently into the arms of Foster.
The second half was a case of West Brom knocking at Palace’s makeshift door but finding it constructed of harder stuff than expected.
There were countless occasions when Pardew’s side appeared set to trouble Julian Speroni only for a player in a Palace shirt to arrive late and block.
The clearest opening came through Rodriguez. He sped on to Jake Livermore’s pass, burst past Mamadou Sakho but was denied by Speroni’s chest first charge.